**Warning: Personal info may be TMI (too much information)**

The other night, Brad Pitt and me had thee best night of raunchy passion. Kicked back to eat Indian food at a small restaurant in Thailand, went back to my room at the hotel and…the rest is my history. 😉

Okay, so it was only a really damn good dream, but if my intentions are to make my dreams come true than this fantastic night of playful fun is a great indication that when dreams come true the end is a surreal feeling.

Flexo from Cosumerism Commentary wrote a great piece called Start the Decade Off Right: Do Something You Love. I really enjoyed the piece and I think you will, too. It sums up that life is too short and it’s time to do something you are passionate about.

How to embark?

• continue to seek out opportunities to discover new and old passions
• eliminate anything that doesn’t stem from passion
• and… try everything if you don’t know what your passions are

The last one really rang a bell with me as I have somehow lost focus with what it is I love to do. Try everything – a simple and profound solution. Make a list of those things you’ve always wanted to do or accomplish no matter how silly it may sounds. Let your ideas fall out of boundries.

Some of my ideas:

• Write a book
• Take martial arts
• Learn woodworking
• Learn to snowboard
• Build a sustainable business
• Travel the world, backpacking
• Jump out of a plane
• Zipline in Costa Rica
• Each lunch with Brad Pitt in Thailand

Now that you have your list. Think of ways you can break it down to smaller tasks to accomplish your big goal. I want to travel the world. Since, I can’t travel it all at one time I am choosing to plan one section of my trip this year. How much is it going to cost? Where will I stay? How do I plan to get around? Then I plan on taking that trip in the near future and marking that section off the list and starting on another.

We can think of 2010 as the decade that passed us by or the decade we are going to take hold of (past vs. present view). Do we wallow at what we didn’t accomplish or look with anticipation at what the future holds? I plan on looking forward to future with anticipation and kicking some Christine butt!

This Week’s Link Love:

Financial Samurai’s The Best Post on Craigslist, And It’s All About Love and Money

Consumerism Commentary’s Start the Decade Off Right: Do Something You Love

The Centsible Lifes’s New Year’s Financial Resolutions

DeliverawayDebt’s How-to Set Up a Car Maintenance Plan and Budget

This Week’s Top 5 Referrer’s:
(people driving traffic to my site – Thank you!)

I’m an Organizing Junkie
An Ostrich Named Sam
Climbing Out
Saving 4 Later
Debt Maven

What are the dreams you will accomplish?

So my husband and I just came back from this location (above). When we got home we threw the keys on the table, called work and QUIT!!!

Got your attention, huh?

We didn’t really quit our jobs, but we have every intention of working towards that goal. We came to the conclusion that we are bored sick of our jobs, tired of making money for a company when we could be harboring our skills for our own company, and want to spend more time as a family.

We are working together to make it happen. Brainstorming to come up with ideas to work for our own. We realize that:

– it doesn’t have to be a “new” idea
– it doesn’t have to be a complicated idea
– that we need to be living and loving the concept (so what do we do now in our lives that we love?)
– And that we can do it! No doubt.

We have hit that line that says to us,

“It is time to take your life into your own hands and make it yours! Claim it! Live it as it was meant to be!”

I’ll keep you updated on our ideas. And I realize I have embarked on this subject before. Let’s refresh. If you could live your dream job what would it be? And why are you not doing it?
It’s time to dream and make it real!

Want some good reading on entreprenuership? Take a look at this website, My Wife Quite Her Job.

7 Weeks ago I started a challenge to PIF 4 cards in 15 weeks time.

• The first 4 weeks I did great staying on schedule.
• The 5th – 6th weeks were still paid on schedule, but I ended up borrowing from the EF for various expenses and buying school clothes (with great discount) on store card.
• Now the 7th week I didn’t submit the payment because of the holiday weekend and our grocery bill was heafty because we stocked up (I have to admit the break was nice)

The scales are now tipping into the negative. By “stealing from Peter to pay Paul” the funds are just getting reallocated. I am paying off one card but gaining debt in another card. Not my goal’s intentions at all!

What to do? With approximately $3000 left to pay, it would take $375 a week to PIF in 8 weeks. That a stressful situation and its got me down. How am I going to handle this situation? Hmmm…

It was recommended that when there is an obstacle you are trying to hurdle and it’s not going your way. Take these steps:

• Re-evaluate the situation. Ask yourself again, “What do I need to do to reach this goal?” Make sure that your goals are challenging but achievable.
• Now, create an Unstoppable Drive. Find what motivates you to reach your goal. Is it reading a self help book, talking with friends, taking a run… get out and find that motivation!
• Organize your goal. Mine is to pay $250 per week to meet the desired result in 8 – 12 weeks. Write down the steps it will take to meet your goal.
• Have faith, believe in yourself, and stay flexible. As much as we would like to go from point A to B, it doesn’t always work that way. A friend of mine published a great quote on her site, “OBSTACLES ARE PUT IN OUR WAY TO SEE iF WHAT WE WANT IS REALLY WORTH FiGHTiNG FOR.” Believe that you will reach that goal, see yourself reach that goal, and realize that Point A to B may have some bumps in the road.

Let’s see how this works for me…

Time to re-evaluate the goal. 3 cards…

• 2 cards @ $2000 need to be PIF’d in 8 weeks. That would be $250 a week. That is a more achievable goal.
• The 3rd card is being PIF’d before the end of the year so that I keep the promotion of not paying finance charges on our purchase. This actually needs to be PIF’d by January 9, 2010. Which means it gives me a bit more time to pay. Additional 4 weeks time @ $1000 = $250 per week.

I am actually feeling better now. It is still a big goal that is going to take a little extra time to meet. But, it is nice to realize I have options, they are acheivable, I will continue to apply determination, and I WILL SUCCEED.

“To dream anything that you want to dream. That’s the beauty of the human mind. To do anything that you want to do. That is the strength of the human will. To trust yourself to test your limits. That is the courage to succeed.” – Bernard Edmonds quotes

Is there a goal that has you stuck? Let’s brainstorm and see if we can’t come up with some more options for acheiving that goal.

I am by means far from practicing religion, but I thought this to be an interesting topic.

We just marked the passing of Ash Wednesday. My coworker, a practicing catholic, attends our annual services, here at work, to be marked with Ash and begins the Season of Lent.

According to Ken Collins:

Lent is a season of soul-searching and repentance. It is a season for reflection and taking stock. Lent originated in the very earliest days of the Church as a preparatory time for Easter, when the faithful rededicated themselves and when converts were instructed in the faith and prepared for baptism. By observing the forty days of Lent, the individual Christian imitates Jesus’ withdrawal into the wilderness for forty days. All churches that have a continuous history extending before AD 1500 observe Lent. The ancient church that wrote, collected, canonized, and propagated the New Testament also observed Lent, believing it to be a commandment from the apostles. (See The Apostolic Constitutions, Book V, Section III.)

I like these words: “soul-searching“, “for reflection” and “taking stock“. So, even those people not practicing religion or believe in religion it is still has a universal understanding that I believe is important for every person. It’s good to reflect on your life and discover your ‘personal’ meaning. Many of us did just this with the mark of the New Year.

Well, here is why I believe practicing Lent is interesting. My coworker, every year comes up with an idea of what she is going to do without for 40 days. 40 days! 6 weeks!

2008: Last year was chocolate. Now that is hard for us woman. No easy task! Did she do it? Mostly. A slip up here or there. Hey, you can’t expect the woman to be perfect when it comes to sweets! lol!

2009: This year it is baked goods. Even those lemon bars she loves so much. If you haven’t noticed, my coworker has a big sweet tooth. She is fortunate though, because she can eat those things and it doesn’t show on her small figure one bit. Ah, one of those women we envy or love to hate. 😉

So, I began to think… what would I give up for 40 days? Well, here is what I am going to give up for 40 days… well, the days left remaining: I am giving up packaged, processed convienence foods. You know, those bags of chips, granola bars, my favorite chex mix, the chinese snack pack w/wasabi peas. The stuff that I feed my kids for lunch, but come home to automatically grab as a snack to tide me over until dinner. The stuff I pop 50 cents into the machine here at work because I am too lazy to pack my own snack to bring to work. And it won’t hurt that I may lose a pound or two from this. Or so I hope. It is my hope that it means I will have to turn to eating fruit and whole foods (dried nuts and fruit, yogurt w/added fruit, whole grain crackers w/sliced cheese and apples, etc…).

My question to you: If you were to give up something for 40 days, what would it be? And do you think you could do it?

If you up for taking up the challenge, let me know and we can keep eachother in check. Happy Monday, you all! ~Money Funk

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